Ontario bans fees for daycares closed during COVID-19 shutdown

The Ontario government has passed an emergency order forbidding daycares from charging parents for services not rendered during the COVID-19 shutdown.

Since the province declared a state of emergency in mid-March, all licensed child-care centres have been shuttered. While some suspended fees, others continued to demand full payment.

The province is now "temporarily preventing child-care centres from collecting payments from parents, while also ensuring that their child-care spaces are protected," the government said in a release issued Friday.

"COVID-19 has imposed significant financial pressure on working parents," said Education Minister Stephen Lecce in a statement.

"We need to support our parents who may be facing reduced income or layoffs during the COVID-19 outbreak."

The province said the order "immediately prevents any child-care operator from charging parent fees where care is not being provided," exempting those that recently opened to provide care for the kids of front-line workers.

"The order also means that parents cannot lose their child-care space because they are not paying fees during this period. This will help provide much needed relief for parents during the outbreak," the government also said.

Lecce said "we are defending the interests of consumers and protecting parents' hard-earned money by ordering child-care centres to stop charging fees for services not rendered," and noted the federal government has supports in place for businesses to help stay afloat during the pandemic.

Parents have been increasingly vocal about the issue of child-care payments, calling them an unreasonable financial demand during the coronavirus crisis - given the province's rising jobless numbers - and considering their children are not receiving any care.

Online petitions have sprung up, including one on change.org that noted the inconsistencies, saying "many families were being charged full child-care fare for services not rendered. Other parents are saying that their daycares will not be charging them or a credit will be given towards future service."

The order also applies to Montessori preschools.

Markham mom Carey Chan - who is behind the change.org petition - had asked "if the government is mandating all child-care centres to close, why is there a difference in the treatment of parents?"

Her family, with two children, was looking at a loss of about $10,000.

In Nova Scotia, P.E.I. and Newfoundland and Labrador, provincial governments are covering daycare costs - including staff wages - while parent fees are suspended.

British Columbia is supporting shuttered child-care centres by covering fixed operating costs, like rent or lease payments.

Lecce said Ontario is "working with federal and municipal partners to ensure that our child-care operators remain sustainable, because one day ... we will emerge from this difficulty and we need to get women and men to re-enter the workforce.

"Our government believes child care is important to ensuring that people can re-enter the workforce with confidence their child is cared for," he told reporters.

But child-care advocates, who have been urging additional funding for programs since they were ordered closed in March, say they are surprised Lecce had nothing more concrete to offer Saturday.

"Many centres were in dire financial straits before COVID-19," said Carolyn Ferns with the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care. "It's pretty hard for a centre to hold a space for a child if the centre is closed when this is over."

Unlike other businesses, child care will be needed "the minute the economy gets out of hibernation and parents return to work," she argued.

"Otherwise nobody is going to be going back to work because they won't have child care," she said.

In Ontario, child-care fees - the highest in Canada - are on average about $1,400 a month.

The Ontario government has previously announced a one-time, $200 payment to families for each child up to age 12.

Laurie Monsebraaten is a Toronto-based reporter covering social justice. Follow her on Twitter: @lmonseb

Kristin Rushowy is a Toronto-based reporter covering Ontario politics. Follow her on Twitter: @krushowy